Publisher's Summary

H.M.S. Surprise, the third in O'Brian's acclaimed Aubrey-Maturin series, follows the variable fortunes of Captain Jack Aubrey's career in Nelson's navy, as he attempts to hold his ground against admirals, colleagues, and the enemy, and accepts a commission to convey a British ambassador to the East Indies. The voyage leads him and his friend Stephen Maturin to the strange sights and smells of the Indian subcontinent, and through the archipelago of Spice Islands where the French have a near-overwhelming local superiority.

Rarely has a novel managed to convey more vividly the fragility of a sailing ship in a wild sea. Rarely has a historical novelist combined action and lyricism of style in the way that O'Brian does. His superb sense of place, brilliant characterisation and a vigour and joy of writing lifts O'Brian above other writers in this genre.

I enjoy all Patrick O'brian's stories and I am delighted that they are beginning to be recorded as audible books. I wish they'd hurry up and record all of this series.

What does Ric Jerrom bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Ric Jerrom brings out the humour and accents of the different characters. His voice is excellent for this story.

Who was the most memorable character of H.M.S. Surprise and why?

All of them.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Jefferson

Jonan-ku, Fukuoka-shi, Japan

26/04/14

Overall

Performance

Story

"Stephen in Distress"

Although Patrick O'Brien's The HMS Surprise (1973) begins with the British Admiralty bureaucracy deciding that the 5 million in gold that Post-Captain Jack Aubrey captured from the Spanish will revert to the crown instead of being divided up among the naval officers and sailors involved, thereby preventing Jack from getting out of debt and marrying Sophia Williams, the third entry in Patrick O'Brien's series of historical novels set in the age of sail during the Napoleonic wars focuses most on the trials, tribulations, and triumphs of Stephen Maturin. Indeed, for much of the novel Jack's odd couple bosom buddy Stephen, the taciturn polyglot ship's surgeon, naturalist, and secret agent, is in physical and or emotional distress. Throughout, he applies his keen intelligence, humane understanding, and philosophical calm to Jack, himself, and the people around them as they cruise for thousands and thousands of miles on various missions aboard the HMS Surprise, stopping at Rio, rounding the Cape of Good Hope, refitting at Calcutta, and so on. Throughout, O'Brien effectively tells his story via multiple narrative modes: third person, Stephen's journal, Jack's letters, etc. Throughout, he manages a perfect mix of naval routine and naval action, on-shore melodrama and local color, historical politics and prejudices. The novel also has plenty of humor, as when Stephen speculates to Jack on "the burden of sex," and how if he were he to castrate all the men on their ship, "they would grow fat, placid and unaggressive; this ship would no longer be a man-of-war. . . . We should circumnavigate the terraqueus world with never a harsh word.”

O'Brien is a master of vivid and lyrical description, whether of

--a Hindu festival: “an approaching line of elephants, so covered with housings, paint, howdahs and tinsel that below nothing could be seen but their feet shuffling in the dust and before nothing but their gilt, silver-banded tusks and questing trunks.”

--a surreal sea: "The whole sea was white, a vast creaming as far as eye could see. . . The whole might have been a white landscape, whose size concealed its terrifying, dreamlike speed."

--a sunrise at sea: "The blaze of light moved down to the topsails, to the courses, shone upon the snowy deck, and it was day. Suddenly the whole of the east was day: the sun lit the sky to the zenith and for a moment the night could be seen over the starboard bow, fleeting away towards America. Mars, setting a handsbreadth above the western rim, went out abruptly; the entire bowl of the sky grew brilliant and the dark sea returned to its daily blue, deep blue."

--an evening at sea: "he remained throughout the frigate's evening activities, leaning on the bowsprit and watching the cut water sheer through mile after mile of ocean, parting it with a sound like tearing silk, so that it streamed away in even curves along the Surprise's side, to join her wake, now eight thousand miles in length."

--a calm sea: “The ship was a world self-contained, swimming between two perpetually-renewed horizons. . . both past and future blur, dwindling almost into insignificance."

--a ferocious battle: "The Surprise slowed, lost her way, and lay shrouded in her own smoke right athwart the Marengo's bows, hammering her as fast as ever the guns could fire. The third broadside merged into the fourth: the firing was continuous now, and Stourton and the midshipmen ran up and down the line, pointing, heaving, translating their captain's hoarse barks into directed fire--a tempest of chain."

--an island mathematically observed: "The boat pulled through a gap in the coral reef to a strand with mangroves on the left and a palm-capped headland to the right; a strand upon which Jack had set up his instruments and where he and his officers were gazing at the pale moon, with Venus clear above her, like a band of noon-day necromancers."

Such passages give an immersive pleasure.

And the reading by Ric Jerrom increases that feeling ten-fold. I can't imagine listening to an O'Brien novel read by anyone else. Jerrom has become for me Stephen (with his slight Irish accent and philosophical wit) and Jack (with his bluff, hearty, "plenitude of being" voice), and anyone else associated with them like Sophia Williams (no simpering or nasal falsettos from Jerom for O'Brien's women, thank you!).

I suspect that O'Brien's twenty books about Jack and Stephen form a single giant composite novel. He writes The HMS Surprise so as to bring new readers up to speed on Jack and Stephen's personalities, backgrounds, careers, and relationships without boring veteran readers, and moves the overarching multi-volume story forward via plenty of new developments and locales, including some sudden suspenseful and vivid scenes of naval combat. People interested in literate, philosophical, and authentic age of sail sea stories (with plenty of Jane Austen-esque manners and melodrama) should try O'Brien's Aubrey-Maturin books, but should probably begin with the first, Master and Commander (1968) and then proceed forward if caught.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

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D. Cottam

Devon,UK

23/12/12

Overall

"Brilliant storytelling"

I've been listening to some of the series and reading others.

This is not my usual fare but the writing is excellent and the sense of period is vividly caught. O' Brian uses a vast vocabulary of C18th century language and evokes the life at sea and on land with all the authentic sounds and smells. He has wry sense of humour too.

Ric Jerrom is perfect to read this. He makes the battles at sea as exciting as a movie. The film Master and Commander was based on these novels. Anyone hankering for a sequel to that film will love listening to this series of books.

I haven't listened to the abridged versions of these novels because I love all the obscure research and background detail that adds depth and perspective to the social and political history. Patrick O'Brian is a real scholar.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

I.F.Coyle

Bolton, United Kingdom

14/10/12

Overall

"Completely brilliant"

I thoroughly enjoyed this. O'Brien is really getting into his stride by Volume 3. We're spending more time at sea now, but the main characters continue to develop both on sea and on land. When's the next one out??Hurry, hurry, hurry!!

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Kugel Ball

23/06/16

Overall

Performance

Story

"Loved it!"

The action with the convoy was enthralling and will be with me for a while.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

D

MATLOCK, United Kingdom

19/01/16

Overall

Performance

Story

"Can't get past the narrator"

Any additional comments?

I like the 2 Patrick O'Brian books I've read so thought I'd try one in audio format. I just couldn't finish this because of the narrator. Unfortunately he voices some of the female characters and even some of the men as if they were pantomime dames. You might like it if you like BBC costume dramas but it was far too mannered for my taste.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

Mr M D HAMPTON

18/09/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"superb!"

love this series of books read them years back but loving this format, makrs the drive to work tolerable

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

Debs J

Scotland

24/03/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"CRACKING!!!"

Just great, cracks along at a great pace! Again, narration is superb, the writing fantastic and the evolution of the characters is great!

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

Steve

Leeds, United Kingdom

13/04/13

Overall

"Another excellent listen"

O'Brian really is the master of Nelson Navy tails and Ric Jerrom makes the books for me, with a hint of accent he brings the characters alive, can't wait to down load the next, just a pity Jereom doesn't narrate them all.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

john

Bentham

16/11/12

Overall

"brilliant"

What a great book.

Great story. Great feel of empire and beautifully read. The master, OBrian, is warming up and Desolation Island has just been released too... :-)

I listen in the car and long journeys are toast.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

david lucas

23/12/12

Overall

"H.M.S Surprise"

To much mush. Spent more than half the book on the feminine side of their lives and not enough on the story line and the action.

0 of 5 people found this review helpful

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